blonde poker forum

Just watching the EPT final table, coupled with Junglecats top reporting of the event. Have to say first time I have watched a webcast and find it very good, considering so many hands are played that we have no idea what the players are holding.

Anyway, they have been playing for almost 4 hours, no real short stacks in comparison to the blinds/antes and then this happens:

Michael McDonald raises to 60K, seat 2 folds Johannes Strassmann pushes all in for around 500K with 3 players still to act.

Now, my thinking here is he probably doesn't want a call, but he must be in reasonable shape because he must know that if gets a call a player will have a hand (I may be totally wrong, its just the way I am thinking). The next 2 players fold and Mcdonald, original raiser calls, showing Pocket Kings, Strassmann tables 7h  8h hearts:

Regardless of the outcome (he lost and was knocked out) was this a good play? why did he make this move at this time? he was in no danger chip stack wise, would he have not been better off picking a better spot?

I would be interested on the thoughts of anyone but certainly those of the more experienced tournament players.
To me it seemed a totally unnecessary move at that particular time. If he wanted to play the hand so badly, could he have not called the 60K seen the flop, then either continued or got away from the hand, or would that have been a bad play also?

It's a bad move because his oppo has Kings.

EPT Final Table....so Strassmann knows this bet isn't get called by anything other than Aces or Kings....because everyone has plenty of time. If nobody is in a rush then there is an argument to suggest you should be in a rush yourself to exploit the apathy. And he knows that should the unlikely call arrive his suited connectors give him the best chance to crack that big pair. Great bet....unless your oppo has Aces or Kings.

lol donkaments

It's a bad move because his oppo has Kings.

EPT Final Table....so Strassmann knows this bet isn't get called by anything other than Aces or Kings....because everyone has plenty of time. If nobody is in a rush then there is an argument to suggest you should be in a rush yourself to exploit the apathy. And he knows that should the unlikely call arrive his suited connectors give him the best chance to crack that big pair. Great bet....unless your oppo has Aces or Kings.


LOL how wrong could this be?????

If Timex needs AA or KK to call a shove here then il give up. He will snap call TT+ and FIST PUMP snap call AK, he probably dwell calls with 77-99. What you have to learn that people have different images and therefore different ranges, when a hyper aggressive player raises he is getting shoved on 1,000,000 times more than when a rock raises. Therefore a good hyper lag adjusts his range accordingly.

The 87s resteal here is probably borderline ev wise given how often Timex is opening but to suggest its only getting called by Aces and Kings is one of the most incorrect statements ive ever read.

If Strassmann thinks the calling range of his bet is 77+ and AK etc...then his push would be a quite ridiculous move.

But he doesn't think that. The fact that it's an EPT final and there's plenty of time makes him think the calling range is much much tighter than that. And that's why he makes the move. He may be wrong....but that's what he's thinking.

Childs should have been fist-pumping to get his money in with Queens against hyper-aggressive Yang's Jacks at the 2007 WSOP Final Table....but he didn't. It's easy to say you're calling with 7's sitting in your bedroom.

Timex called a reshove of 50% of his stack with 22 later on.  Im pretty sure he calls 77+ and AK in this spot.

 :goodpost:

Timex will call strassmann with all his good hands here because he knows strassmann is re-stealing wide...as he has done all final table AND Mcdonald has no fear/ thoughts of laddering up as he is uber-experienced and bankrolled, despite only being 18. No player at the final table was weak/bad enough to muck AK 5 handed in this situation!

It might be a marginally +ev move given timex is opening regularly, but strassmann is the 2nd best player on the final table imo and he can probably isolate and target the other players more effectively.

This hand smacked of frustration to me, given several re-steals from Strassmann got 3 bet AI snapped off, and Rinaldi was squeezing his flat calls effectively and regularly with his squeeze-sized stack. I think strassmann needed to make some adjustments to his strategy and he probably would have but this hand was a mistake in my eyes that never gave him a chance to alter tactics. His image was dog poo by this stage so he probably could have waited to attack with a little more strength knowing the chances of getting restolen on/ squeezed/ looked up were high and his decent hands would pick up lots of value...

Having said that, I think the standard of play at the final was overall excellent (with the odd exception) and I may be overplaying Strassmann's edge a little so perhaps even a marginally +EV play was necessary at this time.

Nice hand to pick out Taxi. That and also the 22 hand LeKnave mentioned were 2 of the fascinating hands of what was an outstanding final table.